Ms. Yang Xiaoyan, a Falun Dafa Practitioner in Liaoning Province, Driven to Mental Illness Through Persecution, Leading to Her Death in 2002

Practitioner Ms. Yang Xiaoyan was a resident in Shenyang City, Liaoning Province. In early January 2000, members of the local 610 Office arrested her. As a result of the persecution she suffered, Ms. Yang became mentally ill. After she fell from a window at her residence, she became bedridden. Ms. Yang Xiaoyan died in July 2002.

Ms. Yang Xiaoyan was 45 years old. She began to cultivate in Falun Dafa in 1996. In early January 2001, police arrested her and sent her to a forced brainwashing class held by the local 610 Office. Personnel from the 610 Office called the brainwashing class the "mandatory class for Falun Gong practitioners."

Because Yang refused to give up her belief, the person in charge of the local 610 Office unlawfully detained her in a morgue at the welfare institute. At the time, the weather was extremely cold. Given the poor insulation, the room was cold and drafty. Later on the persecutors transferred Yang to the No. 4 Detention Centre of Sujiatun, where she suffered torture and as a result became mentally ill.

After she was released, Yang Xiaoyan's condition worsened. One early morning in June 2000, she fell from the window of her apartment on the second floor. Her spine was fractured from the crash. Yang was bedridden after that and had to be nursed by her mother. In July 2002, Yang passed away.

Between October 1999 and May 2000, over 20 practitioners were forced to attend the brainwashing class held at the Welfare Institute. The police detained the practitioners in the morgue located on the first floor of the welfare institute building, which also was used to detain mental patients. During the detention, the perpetrators provided only very thin quilts, even in extremely cold winter weather. The quilts were covered with excrement and dirt and smelled disgusting.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2005/1/12/93334.html